Thanks to Ves for tweeting about this article in Popular Mechanics
AllergyNotes 100 Skills Every Man Should Know: 2008’s Ultimate DIY List http://tinyurl.com/6hqp43
100 Skills Every Man Should Know: 2008’s Ultimate DIY List
Brains and charm are fine, but a real guy needs to know how to do real stuff. After months of debate among PM’s expert editors, here’s our lineup of essential skills, broken down in 10 categories for the competent man-plus 20 tools you need to own.
- Bold Blue - I possess.
- Red - I wish I did.
- Green - I could probably do that.
Automotive
1. Handle a blowout
2. Drive in snow
3. Check trouble codes
4. Replace fan belt
5. Wax a car
6. Conquer an off-road obstacle
7. Use a stick welder
8. Hitch up a trailer
9. Jump start a car
Handling Emergencies
10. Perform the Heimlich
11. Reverse hypothermia
12. Perform hands-only CPR
13. Escape a sinking car
Home
15. Use a sewing machine
16. Put out a fire [a small one.... probably]
17. Home brew beer [how I really wish I could do this]
18. Remove bloodstains from fabric
19. Move heavy stuff [they didn't say how heavy. I move myself everyday, he..he...]
20. Grow food
21. Read an electric meter
22. Shovel the right way
23. Solder wire
24. Tape drywall
25. Split firewood
26. Replace a faucet washer
27. Mix concrete
28. Paint a straight line
29. Use a French knife [first question was; WTF is a French knife? Wiki helped. Yes, I can. I help out with cutting veggies at home. Ask my wife]
30. Prune bushes and small trees
31. Iron a shirt
32. Fix a toilet tank flapper
33. Change a single-pole switch
34. Fell a tree
35. Replace a broken windowpane
36. Set up a ladder, safely
37. Fix a faucet cartridge
38. Sweat copper tubing
39. Change a diaper [YES!!!!!]
40. Grill with charcoal [I've seen it being done, it doesn't look too hard]
41. Sew a button on a shirt [Thanks to loooong years in boarding school & medical college hostel]
42. Fold a flag [of course]
Medical Myths
43. Treat frostbite [never seen one in my part of the world]
44. Treat a burn
45. Help a seizure victim
46. Treat a snakebite
47. Remove a tick
Military Know-How
48. Shine shoes [thanks to life in a British style boarding school]
49. Make a drum-tight bed [same reason as above]
50. Drop and give the perfect pushup [was able to do this in my school days, thanks to an ex-military physical education trainer]
Outdoors
52. Hang food in the wild
53. Skipper a boat
54. Shoot straight [I tried when I was in the US the last time and found out I'm a miserable shot]
55. Tackle steep drops on a mountain bike
56. Escape a rip current
Primitive Skills
57. Build a fire in the wilderness
58. Build a shelter
59. Find potable water
Surviving Extremes
60. Floods
61. Tornados
62. Cold
63. Heat [wrong question to a guy who lives in the hot tropics]
64. Lightning
Teach Your Kids
66. Lend a hand [very vague, so I'll take it as a doable thing he.. he..]
67. Change a tire
68. Throw a spiral
69. Fly a stunt kite
70. Drive a stick shift
71. Parallel park
72. Tie a bowline
73. Tie a necktie
74. Whittle
75. Ride a bike
Technology
76. Install a graphics card [I could do this if I could find some instructions]
77. Take the perfect portrait
78. Calibrate HDTV settings
79. Shoot a home movie
80. Ditch your hard drive
Master Key Workshop Tools
82. Grease gun
83. Coolant hydrometer
84. Socket wrench
85. Test light
86. Brick trowel
87. Framing hammer
88. Wood chisel
89. Spade bit
90. Circular saw
91. Sledge hammer
92. Hacksaw
93. Torque wrench
94. Air wrench
95. Infrared thermometer
96. Sand blaster
97. Crosscut saw
98. Hand plane
99. Multimeter
100. Feeler gauges
Results:
Total - 48 / 100
AWESOME idea! We do need a male-centric meme every now and again. I’ll “weigh in” with something “heavy” soon.
LOL
I know it only says “every Man should know” but I scrolled down the list anyway. Like you, I found a lot of items that made me think “I could do that!”
I can even check off drill drivers, socket wrenches, test lights, multimeters and even the hack saw. I have even (once) used the miter saw at home
But still, this is a very strange list. Those “primitive skills:, for instance. Or the “Outdoors” ones - how many in India would find themselves in the wilderness and have to hang food from trees? Is running a rapid in a canoe an essential skill?
Actually, most of us go through life without knowing most of these skills - which shows how “essential” they are
ok … I had to laugh out loud with .. you THINK you can drive on snow but you can’t carve a turkey????
and when you come to US in December you’ll be where again???
Vijay …love ya! ;o)
Thanks Enrico, Lekhni & Pk.
Waiting for your weigh-in, Enrico.
Lekhni, the list is very biased towards western, specifically American ideas of what skills a man ought to have.
Pk, I’m good at driving, so I’m confident that I can learn to drive on snow. I’m the only meat-eater in a vegetarian family. We don’t cook meat at home. So I have no meat cooking, dressing skills. People don’t eat turkeys here anyway
POPULAR mechanics?! No such thing! More like “Nerdular Nerdics” Hee hee. But seriously, I totally saw that and it was a good little list! I can do alot of them!